Bishop Williamson calls talks between SSPX and Vatican 'dialogue of the deaf'

Bishop Richard Williamson, the controversial Society of St. Pius X prelate whose excommunication was only lifted last year, said recently in an interview that talks between his society and the Vatican are a “dialogue of the deaf.”

The prelate spoke in fluent French during a fifteen minute interview, posted online Jan. 14, with a right-leaning French politician named Pierre Panet. When asked by Panet what he knows of the latest negotiations between the society and the Vatican, the bishop said, “I think it will finish by becoming a dialogue of the deaf” since “the two positions in themselves are irreconcilable.”

“For example,” continued Bishop Williamson, “2+2=4 and 2+2=5, it’s irreconcilable. Therefore (I can think) of three things, one: either they say 2+2=4, renounce reality and say 2+2=5 – that is to say the Fraternity would abandon the truth that God forbids us to do, or that those who say that 2+2=5 convert and return to the truth, or the two come half-way, that means everyone decides that 2+2=4 ½ .”

“It’s wrong,” the prelate stated. “Therefore, either the Fraternity betrays itself or Rome converts, or it is a dialogue of the deaf.”

Bishops Richard Williamson is no stranger to controversy and made headlines in the past for diminishing the extent of the Holocaust. He is currently facing a case against him by the Court of Regensburg in Germany regarding his comments.

Excommunicated with four other bishops in 1988 by the Venerable Pope John Paul II, his excommunication was lifted in 2009 by Pope Benedict XVI as part of a bid to bring about greater Christian unity. Pope Benedict was unaware of the comments made by Bishop Williamson when he lifted the punishment imposed by his predecessor.